The House Of Silk

initials we found on the cigarette case were—’
    ‘WM,’ I interjected.
    ‘Precisely, Watson. And now things begin to fall into place. Let us begin by considering the fate of Keelan O’Donaghue himself. First, what do we know about this young man? Your narrative was surprisingly comprehensive, Mr Carstairs, and for that I am grateful to you. You told us that Rourke and Keelan O’Donaghue were twins but that Keelan was the smaller of the two. They carried each other’s initials, tattooed on their arms, proof, if any were needed, of the extraordinary closeness of their relationship. Keelan was clean-shaven and taciturn. He wore a flat cap which, one would imagine, would have made it difficult to see very much of his face. We know that he was of slender build. He alone was able to squeeze through the gulley that led to the river and so effect his escape. But I was particularly struck by one detail that you mentioned. The gang all lived together in the squalor of the tenement in South End – all, that is, apart from Keelan who had the luxury of his own room. I wondered from the very start why that might be.
    ‘The answer, of course, is quite obvious, given all the evidence I have just laid out and I am happy to say that I have had it confirmed by no less than Mrs Caitlin O’Donaghue who still lives in Sackville Street in Dublin where she has a laundry. It is this. In the spring of 1865 she gave birth, not to twin brothers but to a brother and a sister. Keelan O’Donaghue was a girl.’
    The silence that greeted this revelation was, in a word, profound. The stillness of the winter’s day pressed in on the room and even the flames in the fireplace, which had been flickering cheerfully, seemed to be holding their breath.
    ‘A girl?’ Carstairs looked at Holmes in wonderment, a sickly smile playing around his lips. ‘Running a gang?’
    ‘A girl who would have had to conceal her identity if she were to survive in such an environment,’ Holmes returned. ‘And anyway, it was her brother, Rourke, who ran the gang. All the evidence points to this single conclusion. There can be no alternative.’
    ‘And where is this girl?’
    ‘That is simple, Mr Carstairs. You are married to her.’
    I saw Catherine Carstairs turn pale but she said nothing. Sitting next to her, Carstairs was suddenly rigid. The two of them reminded me of the waxworks I had glimpsed at the fair at Jackdaw Lane.
    ‘You do not deny it, Mrs Carstairs?’ Holmes asked.
    ‘Of course I deny it! I have never heard anything quite so preposterous.’ She turned to her husband and suddenly there were tears in her eyes. ‘You’re not going to allow him to speak to me in this way, are you, Edmund? To suggest that I might have some connection with a hateful brood of criminals and evil-doers!’
    ‘Your words, I think, fall on deaf ears, Mrs Carstairs,’ Holmes remarked.
    And it was true. From the moment that Holmes had made his extraordinary declaration, Carstairs had been gazing in front of him with an expression of peculiar horror that suggested to me that some small part of him must have always known the truth, or at least suspected it, but now, at last, he was being forced to stare it straight in the face.
    ‘Please, Edmund …’ She reached out to him, but Carstairs flinched and turned away.
    ‘May I continue?’ Holmes asked.
    Catherine Carstairs was about to speak but then relaxed. Her shoulders slumped and it was as if a silken veil had been torn from her face. Suddenly she was glaring at us with a hardness and an expression of hatred that would have been unbecoming in any English gentlewoman but which had surely sustained her throughout her life. ‘Oh yes, oh yes,’ she snarled. ‘We might as well hear the rest of it.’
    ‘Thank you.’ Holmes nodded in her direction, when went on. ‘After the death of her brother, and the destruction of the Flat Cap Gang, Catherine O’Donoghue – for that was her given name – found herself in a situation that must have seemed quite desperate. She was alone, in America, wanted by the police. She had also lost the brother who had been closer to her than anyone on this planet, and whom she must have dearly loved. Her first thoughts were of revenge. Cornelius Stillman had been foolish enough to boast of his exploits in the Boston press. Still in disguise, she tracked him down to the garden of his house in Providence and shot him dead. But he was not the only person mentioned in the